PAPERBACK BEST SELLERS: May 26, 1991

Published: May 26, 1991

Weeks This On Week List Fiction 1 4 MESSAGE FROM NAM, by Danielle Steel. (Dell, $5.99.) A woman journalist's coming of age in the 1960's and 70's. 2 11 RED DRAGON, by Thomas Harris. (Dell, $5.95.) An F.B.I. agent hunts a serial killer. 3 32 THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, by Thomas Harris. (St. Martin's, $5.95.) An F.B.I. man and woman track a serial killer. 4 1 THE BURDEN OF PROOF, by Scott Turow. (Warner, $5.95.) An attorney tries to unravel the mystery of his wife's death while defending his wheeler-dealer brother-in-law. 5 5 AN INCONVENIENT WOMAN, by Dominick Dunne. (Bantam, $5.99.) Manners, morals and murder in Los Angeles's high society. 6 5 THE STAND, by Stephen King. (Signet, $6.99.) Doomsday brings horrors to America. 7 * 4 MASQUERADE, by Janet Dailey. (Little, Brown, $5.95.) An heiress encounters a masked man. 8 1 SECRETS OF THE MORNING, by V. C. Andrews. (Pocket, $5.95.) A young music student is haunted by the ghosts of her lovers, present and past. 9 * 4 FAMILY PICTURES, by Sue Miller. (Harper Paperbacks, $5.95.) The good and bad times of a large Chicago clan during the past 40 years. 10 3 THE CAT WHO LIVED HIGH, by Lilian Jackson Braun. (Jove, $4.50.) A reporter and his two cats probe a mysterious death. 11 1 "G" IS FOR GUMSHOE, by Sue Grafton. (Fawcett, $5.95.) On her 33d birthday, the private eye Kinsey Millhone finds herself on a hit list. 12 24 DANCES WITH WOLVES, by Michael Blake. (Fawcett, $4.95.) A Civil War veteran adopts the ways of the Indians and fights for their principles. 13 1 SOJOURN, by R. A. Salvatore. (TSR, $4.95.) The concluding volume of "The Dark Elf Trilogy," a fantasy saga. 14 4 STARDUST, by Robert B. Parker. (Berkley, $5.50.) Problems beset the private eye Spenser when he protects a glamorous television star. 15 9 SKINNY LEGS AND ALL, by Tom Robbins. (Bantam, $5.95.) The horror and humor of the upcoming apocalypse, played out in a restaurant. 16 * 8 THE EVENING NEWS, by Arthur Hailey. (Dell, $5.95.) Two competitive network correspondents. Weeks This On Week List NonFiction 1 10 IT WAS ON FIRE WHEN I LAY DOWN ON IT, by Robert Fulghum. (Ivy, $5.95.) Inspirational essays. 2 79 ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED IN KINDERGARTEN, by Robert Fulghum. (Ivy, $5.95.) Inspirational essays. 3 394 THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, by M. Scott Peck. (Touchstone/S&S, $10.95.) Spiritual inspiration. 4 5 MEN AT WORK, by George F. Will. (Harper Perennial, $9.95.) The craft of baseball. 5 * 41 FROM BEIRUT TO JERUSALEM, by Thomas L. Friedman. (Anchor/Doubleday, $12.95.) The Arab-Israeli conflict over the past decade. 6 1 YOU JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND, by Deborah Tannen. (Ballantine, $10.) The different languages men and women speak. 7 34 THE ROAD FROM COORAIN, by Jill Ker Conway. (Vintage, $8.95.) A historian remembers her childhood on an Australian sheep farm. 8 5 THE SPY WENT DANCING, by Aline, Countess of Romanones. (Jove, $5.95.) The experiences of a C.I.A. operative assigned to trap a NATO mole. 9 6 STORMIN' NORMAN, by Jack Anderson and Dale Van Atta. (Zebra, $4.50.) The career of Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf. 10 1 BY WAY OF DECEPTION, by Victor Ostrovsky and Claire Hoy. (St. Martin's, $5.95.) An account of the operations of Mossad, the Israeli spy service. 11 * 45 NO ONE HERE GETS OUT ALIVE, by Jerry Hopkins and Danny Sugerman. (Warner, $5.95.) The life of Jim Morrison, lead singer of the Doors. Weeks This On Week List Advice, How-To and Miscellaneous 1 10 THE REVENGE OF THE BABY-SAT, by Bill Watterson. (Andrews & McMeel, $7.95.) Cartoons. 2 26 ALL I NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED FROM MY CAT, by Suzy Becker. (Workman, $5.95.) Precepts of a wise cat, in words and pictures. 3 23 THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE, by Stephen R. Covey. (Fireside/S&S, $9.95.) Principles for success. 4 * 43 THE T-FACTOR FAT GRAM COUNTER, by Jamie Pope-Cordle and Martin Katahn. (Norton, $2.50.) How to reduce fat in one's diet. 5 9 THE T-FACTOR DIET, by Martin Katahn. (Bantam, $4.95.) A regimen for weight loss. 6 * 127 CODEPENDENT NO MORE, by Melody Beattie. (Hazelden/HarperSanFrancisco, $8.95.) Solving your own problems while caring for other people. These listings are based on computer-processed sales figures from 3,000 bookstores and from representative wholesalers with more than 38,000 other retail outlets, including variety stores and supermarkets. The figures are statistically adjusted to represent sales in all such outlets across the United States. *An asterisk before a book's title indicates that its sales, weighted to reflect the book-selling industry nationally, are barely distinguishable from those of the book above.